1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to fingerprint identification, and particularly, to a fingerprint identification apparatus for a portable electronic device.
2. Description of Related Art
In information technology, biometrics has become one of the fastest developing technologies for authentication. The most typical and promising biometrics is fingerprint. Fingerprint identification apparatuses have been widely used in attendance machines, door locks and safe boxes. With the rapid development of electronics technology, fingerprint identification apparatuses also have been proposed for application in various portable electronic devices such as personal computers, mobile phones and personal digital assistants.
Capturing of fingerprint images is one of the key techniques of fingerprint identification. Most fingerprint identification apparatuses use a camera module for capturing a fingerprint image of a user. However, this technique is not reliable because it may depend on factors such as lighting and humidity. For example, the light may be too bright or not bright enough for capturing the desired image.
What is needed, therefore, is a reliable fingerprint identification apparatus which uses light sources more efficiently and a portable electronic device having the fingerprint identification apparatus.